This tea I have received from Leafhopper, however it was sitting in my box of oolongs for a little while. Thank you!
And as we have no vintage years here, which would be highly useful, as there is 2012 and 2013 version; I decided to make a new entry. But it seems it is actually very same tea, just different harvest!
What is uncommon as well, is that when I was searching for this tea, Lochan Tea website leads to TeaSwan webshop. As it is direct link; I assume it is just vendor for them, but it is interesting putting TeaSwan branding on the teas though.
Last thing I want to write down before my experience is that I really liked the name from very first time I saw it. Rolling Thunder sounds a little tropical, a little like upcoming monsoon season in India or something like that.
And now to my experience. I have used 90°C water and all 3 grams for my 125 ml gaiwan, which I haven’t been filling fully. I think that I could add 100 ml each steep.
I made a several steeps, in total I think it could be around 6-8. I wasn’t counting them properly as I was studying for finals (held on 6th February). Also steeping times were various, between 20-80 seconds.
At first it was very pleasant, mouth-covering oolong with notes of stonefruits, mostly apricots and peaches, very straightforward, but certainly not boring; with grassy-mineral aftertaste, with meadow-floral aromas. With following steeps it started to be more floral in my opinion, with autumn-leaf notes too, a little like a white tea notes.
Then I did a several a bit longer… around minute long steeps and while those steeps were tasty and enjoyable, it was over rapidly and last steep was just a hot water with hints of leafy flavour. Maybe I over-brewed it fast and thus the tea went boiled away quickly. Also, my hopes for this tea were a bit higher, but afterall it’s Indian oolong, a region not so famous for this tea type.
